How Tarot Works
Our
energy together configures the cards, the particular story, your
story emerges.
"Remember,
energy follows thought. Have you ever seen someone die? When
the Qi, or life force is no longer there, the person is gone.
This is what Qi is, life energy." Dr. Christine Northrup
In
the Chinese tradition, everything has energy, Qi, life force. I
use aspects of the 6,000 year old wisdom of ancient China when reading
cards. Science can now empirically prove that the meridians, or
energy lines within the body are real. I've had acupuncture, and
taken chinese herbs, and recommend them often. Unlike Western traditions
in medicine, Chinese medicine does not separate one part of the
body from the other. Rather, it examines the interconnectedness
of everything in the body. To treat the lungs, you may need to treat
the kidneys. On The Oprah Show Dr. Oz said:
"The future of surgery
is not with knives, Oprah. It's with energy. In the not too distant
future surgeons will use their energy to remove the tumors energy
and then the physical tumor will disappear."
I use the I Ching, an ancient and fascinating method of divination.
No Chinese emperor would go to war without consulting the I Ching
first. I've practiced Soaring Crane Qigong, (pronounced chi gung)
which I learned here in Ireland. Qigong is a practice of several
moves or routines which teach you to gather and move energy. By
using the mind we can control the Qi, within and without.
Another
practitioner of western medicine on Oprah was Dr. Christine Northrup.
She was teaching the studio audience Qigong, to "smile into
your Va JJ"; if you've had a hysterectomy and weren't feeling
too sexual!
In
the Chinese tradition there is a three fold reality. Everyone experiences
this trinity. First there is self, the inner landscape. Second,
the immediate world, friends, family, colleagues. Thirdly, the greater
world at large. In a tarot reading, every card is about the questioner.
At the same time, the same cards also describe the immediate situation
and environment. At the same time, it will also describe the questioner's
relationship to the world. The energy or Qi which we hold within,
will attract the same energy without. In physics, like attracts
like. In the tarot it is the same truth.
Right
or Left Brain?
"He who
is aware of the Male but keeps to the female becomes the river
of the world, he has strength that is not cut to pieces. He is
in touch with the origin of things." Tao
Te Ching, Lao Tzu
"Time
and Space are Real Beings, a Male & a Female. Time is a Man
and Space is a Woman." William Blake
"Man
does, woman is." Robert Graves
"The
intuitive mind is a sacred gift, the rational mind a faithful
servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and
has forgotten the gift... Imagination is more important than knowledge."
Albert Einstein
An
investigation and theory about how to read Tarot cards
The human brain has two distinct and differing sides, a left hemisphere
and a right hemisphere. The left hemisphere is masculine, analytical,
linear and logical. It is language and thoughts. The right hemisphere
is intuitive, feminine, creative, and instinctive. Where the intuitive
mind lives. Tarot engages the right hemisphere of the brain. In
our "right mind" we are pure energy, connected to all
energy, everybody and everything. This is experienced as an overwhelming
sense of "oneness". The right brain is in the moment.
Time literally "stands still". Jill Bolte Taylor
calls it the "we". The left brain, where we usually spend
our waking moments, is concerned with the past and the future, the
"me".
"Great
Spirit is the perfection which absorbs... your Spirit is not made
of thoughts, that which watches thoughts is where spirit lives."
"My stroke of Insight" www.ted.com talk with Jill
Bolte Taylor
One
morning, Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor had a stroke due to cerebral hemorrhaging.
As a neuroanatomist, or brain scientist, she understood exactly
what was happening. What she did not expect was an ecstatic experience,
a "spiritual awakening" if you will. But that is exactly
what happened. When her left "thinking brain" shut down
her shift of perception changed dramatically. She was suddenly experiencing
everything through her right brain. She could not process words
or language. Yet she had the ability to actually see and feel energy.
She was so moved by this dramatic shift in consciousness, it inspired
her to recover. You can see her story on youtube. It is fascinating,
inspiring, and will make you question exactly what is "reality".
How much of life are we missing, stumbling rushing along? The unexamined
life is not worth living. Fundamentally, what everyone needs is
mental strength and self confidence, to manage the mind just as
we manage the outside world.
The
images on the Tarot cards are Archetypal figures. Archetypical figures
were extensively researched by Carl Jung, the father of analytical
psychology. Archetypical figures are:
"...innate
universal psychic dispositions that form the substrate from which
the basic themes of human life emerge. Being universal and innate,
their influence can be detected in the form of myths, symbols,
rituals and instincts of human thought and behavior. Archetypes
are components of the collective unconscious and serve to organize,
direct and inform human thought and behavior."
Jungian Archetypes, www.wikipedia.org
So,
I can tell you, when we agree to sit together, you allow me to create
a connection between our two souls. Using my bell for grounding,
my mind for creative visualization, and the Archetypes on the Tarot
cards for information, I engage the right hemisphere of my brain
to tap into the right hemisphere of your brain.
This
is the psychic zone. It is your "inner landscape", the
internal part of self which is separate from the outer world. Through
the pictures on the cards I can decipher your inner world. It feels
wonderful there! There is no emotion in your "right mind",
so you can easily and unemotionally discuss painful experiences,
past, present and future. Flooded with positivity, everything becomes
possible. I become the medium through which you can contact your
inner self. Everything I see comes from the person I'm reading.
Leonard
Shlain MD is a neurosurgeon who has studied the human brain his
entire life. In his book, The Alphabet Vs. the Goddess he writes:
"....
The human eye evolved opposite but complementary functions. Each
human eye is a perfect mirror image of the other, yet within the
retina there reside two functionally different types of cells.
{Some shaped like rods, the others shaped like cones EB}. With
elegant symmetry, the contrasting functions of the rods and cones
correspond to the division of tasks between the right and left
brain...the rods are extremely light sensitive and detect the
slightest movement... rods perceive reality all at once {evolved
to gather food while scanning horizon. (EB)}... cones, in contrast,
appreciate color and intensify clarity, cones view the visual
field as if through a tunnel {evolved for hunting and killing,
(EB)}... The holistic vision of the rods assisted the right brain
in gathering and nurturing. Tunnel vision was primarily subordinated
to the unique demands of the hunting left brain. Women have more
rods in their retinas than men, and, as a result, have better
peripheral vision. They can see better in the dark and take in
more in a glance than men. Men have more cones than women, allowing
them to see one segment of the visual field in greater detail,
with better depth perception than women."
Leonard Shlain, The Alphabet Vs. The Goddess The Conflict
Between Word and Image, pages 25-26.
So
that explains it! You come home to a mess. Exasperating. When you
ask your husband why he didn't clean up, he answers "clean
up what?" He literally cannot see the jobs that need doing
the way women can!
"I want
to awaken motherhood in men and women, motherhood is something
fast disappearing from the world and is very much needed in today's
world."
Amma speaking on www.uk.youtube.com
|
